MisterWhiplash
James Toback has a wild spirit as a filmmaker and it lets itself out in Harvard Man in both the good and the bad that one finds in self-indulgent artists (I mean that as a compliment, sort of, since art has to be indulgent to a great degree). He takes a story of a basketball player at Harvard, Allan (Adrian Grenier), and transforms his conflicts with his multiple love interests (mob-daughter girlfriend played by Sarah Michelle Gellar, philosophy professor Joey Lauren Adams), his big gamble that he has to take a dive at a game to get his parents money for their house, the FBI after this backfires, and, mostly, his adventure into fifteen thousand milligrams of pure LSD, into a delirious little epic. Yes, epic.Toback's style is all over the place from start to finish. His camera reaches up high and is usually moving, even when there is absolutely no real reason to. The excess in the camera movement is also complimented (or not) by an over-written script, which is something that doesn't happen usually unless a writer, like Toback, doesn't know when to stop with his characters. He compensates by having them talk fast (that or his editor takes out the little catch-my-breath beats in a conversation), and while not as annoying as the camera movements in most scenes in the first half of the film, it's noticeable. It's a filmmaker reaching far, maybe too far, into a realm of personal expression and putting the story into a modern setting - check the Bach mixed with rap and rock for more of that.And yet it's hard to totally begrudge what Toback does get right here. When we're meant to take a lot of this seriously in the first half (the deep philosophical talk in Chesney's class about Kierkegard and Lichtenstein or that mob 'family' of caricatures), it's interesting but it never really works dramatically. But when Toback suddenly shifts the tone in the second half, when Allan takes the three cubes of LSD, it suddenly becomes a full-on comedy of errors and surprises. To be sure, some of the visual jokes and whacked-out faces that Allan sees could be attributed to the same style as Fear & Loathing in Las Vegas, it still works. Especially funny is how Allan just seems to slip out of the FBI's hands (watch the one really strong scene of cinematography, sound, and acting all combined in the FBI interrogation room), and a masterpiece of a cameo appearance from Al Franken (like Toback also former Harvard alum).It also helps with the comedy in the second half of the film that the acting, more or less, is pretty strong. Sarah Michelle Gellar actually gives one of her most convincing, well-rounded performances as a B-word whose intentions are not very well hidden but puffed up with rich-girl sass and sex appeal. Grenier also goes for broke as a guy with a good sense of himself, until he bugs out from the acid and runs all over town. Adams might be a little more of the one-note performance, the stable voice but not as intriguing as Gellar and Grenier in their roles. They're all put in a movie that is mixed up and has a lot to say about sex, drugs, life, living, betting, sports, and lots more. I respect Harvard Man, and if those trip-out scenes come on TV I'll be sure to watch again. But recommend? No. 5.5/10
Helena727
I'd give it a zero if I could. Thank goodness I didn't rent this (saw it on TV). The bloatedly egotistical writer/director, who's way too in love with his Harvard degree, wasted a decent idea by creating one-dimensional characters and then casting with second-rate actors -- none of whom is a complex-enough/bright-enough person or skilled-enough actor to convince viewers that they're Harvard students or instructors -- who turned in one-dimensional performances. I can only imagine that he was jumping on the youth bandwagon and thus cast some of the names of the moment, but he would have done better had he gone with unknowns who are actually gifted. Utter waste of time; do not watch this.
Mark Sacre
Well, whoever gave this a high rating must also have been taking the home-made LSD that the main character took. I don't want to give the plot away because there may be people out there who wish to see this film - relatives of the actors for instance and ... nope that's about it. The main character twitches his way through this film but with no real evidence of why he is where he is - Harvard, with Sarah Michelle Geller as a girlfriend and lecturer as another. Just what they are supposed to see in him is a mystery to me since money, looks, intelligence and charm seems to be completely lacking.The plot line of needing money to help his parents seems so out of place for a self-centred student that is almost forgotten later in the film. Various characters seem to swing widely from one characteristic to another (watch out for the basketball playing friend moving from honourable wanting to do the best to gun-toting anger).At the end, not giving anything away but I really didn't care what happened to the main (or any other) character except to pray that no-one ever considered making a sequel. That's a couple of hours of my life wasted !
clb_16190
Basketball is a winter sport, right? Hmmmm. Based upon this movie, it's interesting that, in Cambridge, MASSACHUSETTS the weather during basketball season allows for sleeveless clothing outdoors, leaves on the trees and no snow or ice on the ground. Trust me, I live in the Boston area - even a freak warm spell during the months of b'ball season would not look like this.So - aside from the fact that this is just a very bad movie - they didn't even try for authenticity. Especially when so much of the movie's backdrop is the Harvard campus and Cambridge. No wonder I had never heard of this movie until it was broadcast on TV and nothing else was on to watch!Well, I'm sure I can find something else . . . gotta go find the remote!
